


of soggy fries and your smile

by tostitos



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Deaf Character, Fluff, M/M, they're cute idk, yuta is the real mvp, yutae work at mcd's
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-24
Updated: 2017-08-24
Packaged: 2018-12-19 10:43:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11896077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tostitos/pseuds/tostitos
Summary: Working the late night shift at a twenty-four hour McDonalds is kind of like being suspended in a weird limbo between the world of the intellectual living and actual Hell but Taeyong would be lying if he said he doesn’t have a little bit of a crush on the cute brunet who comes in the middle of the night every so often, points out his order of a large iced tea with a smile that makes Taeyong weak, and does work on his Macbook until whenever he decides to leave.





	of soggy fries and your smile

**Author's Note:**

> i noticed in a lot of fic that deaf characters have severe (like 100%) hearing loss so i wanted to try writing someone with more moderate hearing loss. hopefully it's not a huge mess :/

Taeyong musters up a smile as he hands over a white, red, and yellow paper bag to a kid who would honestly be on the floor if it weren’t for her friend holding her up. Working the late night shift at a twenty-four hour McDonalds is kind of like being suspended in a weird limbo between the world of the intellectual living and actual Hell (if Hell was full of drunk college students who get mad when you tell them ‘no, we don’t serve breakfast at two am’ and who throw barbecue sauce at each other because why act like a civilized adult in weird limbo?)

As he watches the duo stumble over to a two-seater table by the door, Taeyong feels any bit of customer service left seep out of him. He slumps against the counter, hip pressed uncomfortably against the edge, and allows his eyes to slip shut.

“You alive over there?”

Sighing, Taeyong peels his eyes back open. His gaze falls on Yuta who has a red sleeve full of limp fries in his hand. He shakes his head.

“You’re going to get fired if you keep eating the food,” he says even as he reaches out to snatch a fry.

Yuta shrugs. “It’d be a blessing.” He pops another fry into his mouth. “Also, do you know how much we throw away? There are children starving in this country, you know. I’m eating in solidarity with them.”

Snorting, Taeyong shakes his head. “Don’t complain to me when Soonkyu gives you the boot.”

“I’d more likely comfort you as you sob about how you can’t live without me.”

Sudden cheering draws their attention and Taeyong turns to see a group of five boys crowded into a booth throwing chicken nuggets into the air and trying to catch them in their mouths. It’s not them who hold his attention, though, but the boy sitting at a table tucked in the corner who seems to not be bothered by all of the ruckus.

Taeyong would be lying if he said he doesn’t have a little bit of a crush on the cute brunet who comes in the middle of the night every so often, points out his order of a large iced tea with a smile that makes Taeyong weak, and does work on his Macbook until whenever he decides to leave.

“TY, if you don’t go over there and talk to him, I will,” Yuta says behind him, talking and chewing with his mouth open.

Feeling a chill run down his spine at the awful sound of saliva, Taeyong pushes his coworker away. “I can’t just sit down in front of him and start a random conversation.”

“You’ve been pining over this kid for a hundred years. Go over there or I’m telling Soonkyu you’ve been eating the goods.” Putting down his nearly empty sleeve of fries on the counter, Yuta grabs Taeyong by the shoulders and steers him around the corner.

“Yuta, it’s not that deep.” Taeyong tries to dig his heels into the floor but all that makes Yuta do is change tactics and pull him along by the elbow. “Yuta, seriously.”

“You’ll thank me later,” says Yuta before pushing Taeyong into the seat across from his crush.

“Yuta!” Taeyong hisses, reaching for his friend who dances out of reach. Clenching his hand into a fist, he sighs and glances at the boy he’s been forced to talk to.

The boy returns his look with his own skeptical gaze.

“Uh, hey.” Taeyong waves awkwardly. He swipes his tongue over dry lips. “I-I noticed you come here a lot to study and I guess I was curious, but I don’t want to bother you if you’re busy so I’ll just…” He gestures at the line of registers.

The boy narrows his eyes at him but in a way that shows he’s less annoyed and more confused. Before Taeyong can stand, he opens his mouth. “I…don’t mind,” he says, voice unsure and soft like he’s consciously trying to keep quiet. “But it’s loud in here and I don’t have my aids in. I don’t imagine you can sign either.”

Taeyong doesn’t immediately understand but then the boy fiddles with an ear lobe and explains, "I'm Deaf."

He doesn’t want to come off as the kind of jerk who’s surprised to meet someone hard of hearing, but Taeyong still blinks wide eyes at the other boy.

“I can introduce myself!” he blurts out, feeling a strange need to find some kind of connection to the other boy.

From the look on the other boy’s face, eyes trained on Taeyong’s lips, he’s trying to piece together the shape of his mouth with whatever amount of sound he can hear.

Taeyong lifts his hands, and in stiff, unfamiliar movements, signs, “My name is Taeyong.” It’s the only sign language he knows — that and the alphabet — but his effort earns him a smile and laugh that has the butterflies in his stomach fluttering about frantically.

The boy signs back fluently and Taeyong is so interested in watching his hands that he would have missed his name if the boy wasn’t also speaking aloud. “I’m Dongyoung. Sorry, I’m not prepared for a conversation but thanks for trying.”

Taeyong shakes his head and smiles, gesturing that it's okay. A flying chicken nugget reminds him of where he is and Taeyong looks up in time to see a pale faced boy limp to the restroom, probably to throw up and completely miss the toilet. Wonderful.

His smile completely drops from his face and he groans.

Dongyoung turns around to see what he's looking at and grimaces as well. "Must be fun having to deal with people like this," he comments as he turns back. Taeyong's scoff makes the smile on his face grow. “You should probably go. I’ll remember to wear my aids next time so we can talk better.”

Nodding, Taeyong stands up and dusts imaginary particles off his jeans. "I guess I'll see you later?"

Dongyoung nods as well and flashes him a light smile.

 

Even on nights when he gets six hours of sleep, Taeyong is never fully awake when he trudges up to one of the campus coffee carts at eleven thirty. His body should be used to this; he has worked the ten to three shift at McDonald's for months now plus he's a college student. Unconventional sleep hours shouldn't even be a problem. But still, he can barely peel his eyes open enough to order a medium black coffee.

He stops himself from drinking it and burning his tongue as soon as he gets his hands on it and shuffles over to the counter where the sugar packets are. As he pours three packets of sugar into his liquid energy, he feels a light tap on his shoulder. A garbled groan bubbles out of his throat and when he finally gets his head to turn to look over his shoulder, he's met with Dongyoung wearing a sunny grin.

"Good morning to you, too." Dongyoung wags his fingers in a wave and Taeyong fumbles to look less disgusting.

"Oh, uh, hi!" Taeyong turns properly to face the tall man, except, in doing so, he spills sugar all over the counter and the floor. He immediately rights the paper sleeves, saving whatever sweetener is still left. He coughs awkwardly.

Unlike Taeyong, who's dressed in an old, yellow KEEP CALM AND SAVE THE BEES t-shirt and a pair of black adidas sweatpants with his hair tucked under a beanie that's a little too warm for September, Dongyoung looks cute in a white t-shirt tucked into bleached jeans with a pale blue flannel shirt tied around his waist. He also looks like he's trying not to laugh, teeth digging into his pretty pink bottom lip, and suddenly Taeyong doesn't care how much of a disaster he is right now because at least Dongyoung is enjoying the show.

"Not a morning person?" Dongyoung asks, walking up beside Taeyong. He pulls out a napkin from the holder and uses it to sweep up the sugar particles from the counter.

From his side, Taeyong can see the thin tube that trails from the inside of Dongyoung’s ear canal to up and over the helix. He has his hearing aids on. "I am. Which is why I haven't fully adjusted to working nights." Finishing pouring his sugar, Taeyong crumples the empty packets and tosses them in the nearby bin.

Dongyoung hums sympathetically and hands Taeyong a stirrer.

As Taeyong dissolves the sugar, he looks around the open floor at the students loitering around before eleven o'clock hour lectures end. "Do you have a class?" He's never seen Dongyoung in this building at this time but that's not too much of a surprise with how huge their campus is. Plus, on a normal day, Taeyong would be huddled in one of the nearby chairs with his headphones in, ignoring the world and not falling asleep on his feet. He had a pretty rough start that morning.

"No, I'm waiting for a friend who's in class right now so we can get lunch," Dongyoung answers. "Do you?"

"Yeah. Paleoclimatology." He tosses the stirrer and blows over the surface of his coffee before he snaps the lid back on.

Dongyoung blinks and tilts his head confusedly. "What are you majoring in?"

Huffing a laugh, Taeyong takes a cautionary sip of his coffee. It's still too hot, but it's a heat he can handle. "Environmental Science."

Dongyoung's eyes trail down Taeyong's front, reading his shirt, and he nods, chuckling a bit himself. "Yeah, that makes sense."

They move from the coffee stand closer to the wide double doors leading to the lecture hall. Dongyoung takes his phone out to check the time.

"It's nice to be able to talk with you," Taeyong says suddenly, taking a sip of his coffee as soon as the words leave his mouth.

Dongyoung looks over at him with a smile. "It is. I don't usually wear my aids because it's easier for me to focus that way and, to be honest, I'm not interested in anything anyone has to say at one in the morning at a college McDonald's."

The latter is something Taeyong understands completely. What he doesn't get is why Dongyoung goes there to study in the first place, but that question isn't the one that finds its way out of his mouth. "Do you mind if I ask about..." He trails off but Dongyoung's finishes for him.

"My hearing?"

Taeyong nods. He casts his eyes to the floor, feeling odd now that the question is in the air.

Dongyoung turns his phone over in his hands. "I caught meningitis as a kid. My parents had an unfortunate anti-medicine phase and by the time they realized they should take me to the hospital, I had already been sick long enough that the hearing loss was permanent."

Taeyong wasn't expecting anything in particular, but that surely wasn't on the list of possibilities. "Oh."

"Yeah..." Dongyoung draws out the sound. "But I'm alive and my parents got their shit together so that's all that matters." His phone vibrates in his hands and he looks down at it just as the doors to the lecture room across the hall swing open.

Taeyong watches him type out a quick text and then scan the swarm of students for who must be his friend.

"Is your friend in that class?" He guzzles down a third of his coffee.

Dongyoung nods with a light 'mhm'. He suddenly waves to someone before turning to Taeyong with his phone clutched in hands raised at his chest. "Do you work tonight?"

"No, I'm off actually." Taeyong plays with the seal of the cardboard sleeve around his cup, peeling it back. He likes to think he's not imagining the pout that settles on Dongyoung's face, butterflies fluttering pleasantly in his stomach at the thought of his crush being disappointed at not being able to see him.

The moment is cut by a handsome boy who walks up to them with a broad smile. He doesn't acknowledge Taeyong at first, immediately signing to Dongyoung who puts his phone away to talk.

Taeyong doesn't know why, but there's something about watching Dongyoung speak with his hands that he finds incredibly mesmerizing. There are people who have such fantastic voices that you could listen to them read an encyclopedia all day.

Taeyong feels like he can watch Dongyoung speak all day.

Dongyoung and his friend go back and forth. At one point, his friend says something that makes Dongyoung nibble on his lip and shoot a glance in Taeyong's direction.

They lock eyes for a brief second before Taeyong tears his eyes away and pretends to be more interested in chugging the rest of his coffee, his ears staining red.

"We'll finish talking about this later," the friend says with laughter in his voice. "It's not fair to your friend."

"You started the conversation in KSL."

Taeyong peeks over again at Dongyoung's whining, wanting to see the indignant pout on his face and not being disappointed.

"You didn't have to sign back," the handsome man quips back before directing a smile at Taeyong. "I'm Jaehyun."

"Taeyong," he introduces himself in turn. The doors to the room his next class is in swing open and he looks over at the students who pour out. He rolls his shoulder, shifting the bookbag hanging off his back. What else is there to say?

"Doyoung, I'm gonna run to the bathroom," Jaehyun says, already backing away from their spot along the wall.

Waving him off with an uninterested hum, Dongyoung fiddles with the hearing aid behind his left ear. "I guess it's not really fitting to say I'll see you later since you don't work today."

Clearing his throat, Taeyong rocks back on his heels and feigns a chic, unaffected air even as he's overcome with nerves. "You could see me later...if you gave me your number." There's nothing left to drink, but he still pretends to.

Dongyoung is quiet for a second and then he laughs so sweetly Taeyong would call it a giggle. "Are we not allowed to meet up if I don't give you my number? What if I'm not comfortable with giving out my number to the random guy I met at McDonald's once?"

Taeyong splutters because that's not what he meant. "I just...having your number would make it easier and it seemed like you wanted to...I didn't..."

His mouth snaps shut when Dongyoung holds out his phone.

"I'm kidding," Dongyoung says, grinning all wide and happy and pretty.

Taeyong's breath catches in his throat. "Oh."

"I'm supposed to tutor some of the KSL students at six but other than that, I'm free."

Taking the unlocked phone in hand, Taeyong types in his number with a shaky hand. "Would you, um, like to get coffee tonight then? I know a nice place." He reads over the number ten times before handing the phone back; it'd be just his luck that he'd mistype a number and embarrass himself.

"It's a date." Dongyoung smiles down at his phone.

It's a figure of speech, Taeyong tries to remind himself, Dongyoung doesn't mean it like that so don't get excited.

"Y-Yeah." Inwardly wincing at the way his voice cracks, Taeyong rubs at his throat.

"I hope you know there's going to be nowhere to sit in the dining hall." Jaehyun's voice comes from Taeyong's side before the other boy steps back into view.

"Yeah, yeah." Pocketing his phone, Dongyoung grins at Taeyong and reaches behind his ear again. "So, I'll see you later? I'll text you about the time?"

Taeyong nods, all coolness lost as he returns the other man's grin with one twice as wide. "Later."

**Author's Note:**

> i had originally planned to write another part (maybe in doyoung's pov) but for now i'm satisfied with this so who knows if/when that'll get done


End file.
